Before the fall of 2018, Sue and I had never really sailed, unless you count one Sunfish Rental at Lake Crabtree Park in Morrisville, NC and a daysail that Sue did in Buffalo, NY when she was co-oping at General Motors. We've owned a 17' Jetboat used in local lakes since June of 1998, but that's usually 4 or 5 hours max at a time on relative calm waters.
So what happened to get us on the Sailing kick? Buying a Krispy Kreme box truck and visiting friends in Annapolis, of course!
Our business was expanding and needed an additional installation vehicle. I found an ex-Krispy Kreme delivery box truck that fit the bill, being sold by Penske in Baltimore, MD. (It smelled amazing, by the way). In order to get it back to Raleigh, I'd have to fly up to Baltimore on a Friday, pick up the truck and then drive back to Raleigh with Sue staying in Raleigh to keep things running.
Our super-close friends, and best-man (Jesse) and Matron of Honor (Lisa) live in Annapolis and invited me to spend the night at their place before having to drive back. "Oh, and by the way, one of the largest sailboat shows in the country (probably world) is going on, so let's go there after you get the truck?" Sounded fun to me.
We arrived in downtown Annapolis and had a lunch and a few drinks. It was becoming obvious that Annapolis is a drinking town with a sailing problem. After lunch we walked to the show and it's a big show, focused just on sail boats. Remember, at this point, I pretty much knew nothing about sailing. I peppered Jesse with questions, since he is an avid sailor that grew up sailing on the Finger Lakes of NY, crews on racing boats often and Bareboat charters in the BVIs every year. Me: "What's this rope for?" Jesse: "First, that's called a line or sheet." Me: "Why does this sheet go to there?" Jesse: "That's actually a halyard"
After walking around for a while, we starting visiting big, beautiful catamarans and as it turned out, Lisa and Jesse's retirement plan is to sell everything and live on a 40-something foot catamaran in the Caribbean. We probably toured at least 8 catamarans, each have 3 or 4 cabins, 3 or 4 heads and having amazingly open and inviting interiors.
By the end of the show I was hooked! I wanted to copy their retirement plan! The idea of having none of the responsibilities that come along with unnecessary possessions and being able to see new places all the time consumed my thoughts for the drive back to Raleigh and I couldn't even wait until getting back to tell Sue all about my experience and my epiphany. We talked about it on my drive back and more over the next couple of days, and she actually seemed interested in learning more?!
The next step was to start learning and giving ourselves reality checks...
-Mike
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